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Trailers: ‘The Box’

Donnie Darko left me breathless, literally. The credits came up, my mouth was wide open, and I was completely in awe. Southland Tales left me another kind of breathless; pissed off, mouth agape in confused wonder. So with that, I present the trailer for Richard Kelly’s follow-up The Box, based on Richard Matheson’s short story, “Button, Button”, which later became a Twilight Zone episode. The story concerns a married couple who are offered a simple proposition: “Push the button and you’ll receive a million dollars, however; somewhere, someone you don’t know will die.” What would you do?

This trailer is a poor example (mostly the music), but I believe we’re in for something special. When I finished the script for his upcoming adaptation of I actually had to stop a moment to pause. This isn’t like anything we’ve gotten from Richard Kelly before. It’s much darker than Darko, insanely more cohesive than Tales, and more mainstream than both. It’s a disturbing story, with a great hook, and an amazing ending. I don’t know what draft I read, but I’m really excited for Kelly to prove everyone wrong. The film stars Cameron Diaz, James Marsden, and Frank Langella. It is being scored by Win Butler, Regine Chassagne, and Owen Pallett, of Arcade Fire and Final Fantasy fame, respectively.